1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to gate apparatus that are introduced into toll facilities such as toll parking lots, toll roads, toll bridges, on-board units mounted on vehicles, setup method of onboard unit and toll collecting method and judging method of the entrance and exit.
2. Description of the Related Art
For example, at toll facilities such as express highway, a nonstop automatic toll collection system (ETC system) by which the issuance of pass at the entrance is no more required and the toll collection is executed automatically at the exit, is now on the stage of practical use.
Normally, a vehicle class discriminator and an automatic ticket issuing machine are provided at the entrance of the toll road and the vehicle entering the entrance is detected by a vehicle class discriminator comprising various detectors. As the result of the detection, the vehicle class is discriminated automatically, and a ticket recorded with vehicle class, number of the tollgate, the entrance entered, date and time of entrance is issued automatically by the ticket-issuing machine. Therefore the entrance is unmanned.
On the other hand, in recent years, an electronic toll collecting system (Electronic Toll Collection System: ETC system) that performs toll settlement using a wireless communication is under examination for introduction.
In this ETC system, a vehicle is provided with an on-board unit which is provided with an IC-card which stores the ID of users private person, the control number of the vehicle, data of the entrance and exit and the like, and a wireless communication function and on the other hand, at the entrance and the exit of the toll road, entrance gate apparatus and exit gate apparatus are installed, which exchange data by wireless communication with the on-board unit and collects the toll.
The entrance gate apparatus writes in the entrance data in the on-board unit by communicating with the on-board unit, and the exit gate apparatus performs a calculation of the toll basing upon the data of the entrance, data of vehicle obtained by a wireless communication with the on-board unit at the exit and request the host computer that is an apparatus of a higher rank to draw the toll from the account, and then transmits to the vehicle the data for writing in such as the result of the processing to write the result of the processing in the on-board unit. As described in the above, the ETC system makes it possible to collect the toll for the respective vehicles unmanned.
However, the automatic toll collection can be performed in the range of 99 and several tenths percent, even in the case of ETC system, which seems to be ideal, and the remaining vehicles must be processed manned.
In other words, vehicles of various sizes, outer shapes, and utilization are travelling on the roads. For example, emergency vehicles such as ambulance cars, fire engine trucks, the cars that are driven by physically handicapped persons, omnibuses that travel in route and sight seeing buses, both of which the outlooks are same but belong to different categories for the tolls, trailers which travel in the state that two cars are connected, (traction engines) and further vehicle of which outlook are modified and which are approved for travelling on public roads.
Though these vehicles may utilizes the toll roads, the vehicle class discriminator of the prior art depends on the infrared sensors, stepping sensors, cameras for recognizing the number, which discriminate the vehicles by the outlooks. Therefore, it is almost impossible to discriminate all the classes of vehicles exactly, and it can not be said that the discriminating system of the prior art is perfect from the viewpoint of accuracy.
On the other hand, when an ETC system should be introduced, not only the operating enterprise of the toll installation should install various apparatus in the entrances and exits of the respective facilities, but also the users and car dealers have to take following procedures from the time of application for the ETC utilization, until they may utilize actually ETC system.
And car shops sell the on-board units, which can be used for ETC system. The users who are desirous to receive services of ETC using this on-board unit, have to file an application with a certain organization (hereinafter called operating enterprise) such as highway road enterprise after they have procured on-board units and to setup the data necessary for automatic toll collection provided by the operating enterprise.
In this case, the user is to mount an on-board unit that is procured from a car dealer or a car shops on the vehicle. This mounting work may be performed by the users by himself, however, normally the mounting works is ordered from the dealer, from whom the on-board units was purchased, as it might cause troubles of the vehicle, if the user were not familiar with the electric system inside of the vehicle.
For example, when the car dealer mounts an on-board unit on the user""s vehicle, the car dealer fills up the necessary items in a application form attached to the on-board unit, and mails the same together with a copy of automobile inspection verification of the vehicle, that the user has, to the operating enterprise.
The operating enterprise prepares an IC-card, in which the following data are stored, to be used exclusively for setup (hereinafter called as setup card) and returns the same to the car dealer or to the user. The data to be stored in the setup card are the number of the on-board unit, the data of the on-board unit proper, and the data on the key necessary for security, and the like.
When the car dealer has received the setup card from the operating enterprise, the car dealer informs the user of the receipt of the setup card, and fixes the date for mounting the on-board unit with the user and mounts the on-board unit in a short time on the vehicle in that day, when the car dealer has received the vehicle from the user. Thereafter, the setup card is set into the on-board unit and operating the on-board unit carries out the setup work.
When the setup card is set in the card slot of the on-board unit, the on-board unit reads in the data stored in the setup card and checks whether or not the card set is a right setup card, and whether or not the data of the on-board unit coincide with data of setup card and so on. When all the checks are OK""d, the data of the setup card are stored in the memory of the on-board unit and then the on-board unit can be used.
Then, the vehicle with the on-board unit, which setup is completed, is returned from the car dealer to the user, and the user can receive services of ETC, when the user drives the vehicle and enters into a toll road.
Also, the user may replace the vehicle with a new one after several years, even when the user made a registration of the on-board unit. In such a case, in other words, when the registration of the vehicle is changed or when the on-board unit is mounted on another vehicle, it becomes necessary to change the data of the on-board unit proper stored in the on-board unit. In this case it is also necessary to perform the procedure.
Furthermore, in case two or more vehicles are connected each other and are driven, it is not possible to judge the connecting condition by the data obtained by photographing the number plate of the first vehicle by a camera, it is also necessary to register additional data peculiar to the vehicle on the on-board unit through the IC card or to change the registered data. In this case also, it is necessary to perform the procedure, the working volume of the user increases always and the operation and the management of the system become complicate.
As described in the above, in the case of the gate apparatus of the prior art, the vehicle class discrimination is performed by detecting the outlook of the vehicle, and the system is not perfect in regard to the accuracy of the detecting the vehicle class and also there has been a problem that the check and the management of entrance and exit of the vehicles that utilize the toll facilities can not be automated completely.
Also, the user has to procure a setup card through a complicate procedure and to perform a setting up work, before the user may utilize the toll facilities. If so, even if the system is prepared to offer an excellent service, the users and car dealers think it difficult and this prevents the increase of the users of the services and becomes a reason for preventing the generalization of the system.
An object of the present invention is to provide a gate apparatus, an on-board unit, a setup method for the on-board unit and a toll collection method and a judging method of the entrance and exit of the vehicles, which can automates the check and the management of the entrance and exit of the vehicles utilizing the toll facilities completely.
Also, an other project of the present invention is to provide a gate apparatus, an on-board unit, a setup method for the on-board unit and a toll collection method and a judging method of the entrance and exit of the vehicles, which are able to contribute the generalization of the service, by making the setup of the data for utilizing the toll facilities and their services in the on-board unit mounted on the vehicle easily.
According to the present invention, there is provided a gate apparatus for judging the entrance and exit of a vehicle, which is attached with a wireless tag that is stored with a data peculiar to the vehicle, and, on which an on-board unit having a wireless communication function is mounted, comprising first wireless communication means for procuring the data peculiar to the vehicle by the wireless communicating with the wireless tag; and second wireless communication means for procuring the data of the on-board unit stored in the on-board unit and IC card data set in the on-board unit by the wireless communicating with the on-board unit.
Furthermore, according to the present invention, there is provided an on-board unit, which is mounted on a vehicle attached with a wireless tag in which a data peculiar to the vehicle is stored, and which may utilize a contracted service after a data for the user of the vehicle to utilize the contracted service is registered in a memory, comprising wireless communication means for transmitting the data stored in the memory, in case the data is requested by wireless communication by a wireless apparatus of the contracted service presenting side before the registration; and registering means for registering an unregistered data in the memory, in case the unregistered data is answered back to the memory by wireless communication to the data transmitted by the wireless communication means.
Also, according to the present invention, there is provided a setup method of an on-board unit, which is mounted on a vehicle attached with a wireless tag in which a data peculiar to the vehicle is stored, and which may utilize a contracted service after the data for the user of the vehicle to utilize the contracted service is registered in a memory, comprising the steps of obtaining the data peculiar to the vehicle by wireless communicating with the wireless tag; obtaining a data of the on-board unit stored in the on-board unit and an IC card data set in the on-board unit, by the wireless communicating with the on-board unit; judging whether or not an unregistered data can be registered by comparing the obtained data peculiar to the vehicle and the IC card data, when the data necessary for judging the entrance and exit of the vehicle is not yet registered among the procured data of the on-board unit; and registering the necessary data included in the data peculiar to the vehicle into the on-board unit through the wireless communication, when the unregistered data can be registered as the result of the judging step.
Furthermore, according to the present invention, there is provided a toll collecting method using an on-board unit, which is mounted on a vehicle attached with a wireless tag in which a data peculiar to the vehicle is stored and, in which a data for a user of the vehicle to utilize an automatic toll collection service is registered, the toll collection method comprising the steps of: obtaining the data peculiar to the vehicle by wireless communicating with the wireless tag; obtaining a data of the on-board unit stored in the on-board unit and an IC card data set in the on-board unit, by the wireless communicating with the on-board unit; judging a discrimination of the vehicle class and a propriety of the utilization of the automatic toll collection service basing upon the procured data of the on-board unit and the IC card data and the data peculiar to the vehicle; and performing toll collection process for the vehicle that may utilize the automatic toll collection service corresponding to the judged vehicle class as the result of the judging step.
Also, according to the present invention, there is provided a judging method for judging a propriety of the entrance and exit of a vehicle by wireless communicating with an on-board unit having a wireless communicating function mounted on the vehicle, when the vehicle attached with a wireless tag in which a data peculiar to the vehicle is stored enters and exits from a toll facilities, comprising the steps of obtaining the data peculiar to the vehicle by the wireless communicating with the wireless tag; obtaining an IC card data set in the on-board unit from the on-board unit by the wireless communicating with the on-board unit; discriminating a vehicle class and judging a propriety of the utilization of the toll facilities basing upon the IC card data and the data peculiar to the vehicle; and permitting the entrance and the exit to the toll facilities for the vehicle that is judged as permissible to utilize the toll facilities as the result of the judging step.